My Old Kentucky Stereotype Transcript

Prologue

(playful music starts)

Angie Hatton: When I moved to Nebraska A few years ago, I started hearing that joke more and more that we, Kentuckians, marry their cousins. Like one joke I heard recently was: Why are there so many unsolved murders in Kentucky? Because there's so few dental records and everyone has the same DNA. 

Ariel: Oh, man, that’s so bad. 

Austin Carter: So, Ariel, when you were growing up in Colorado, were there “Colorado Jokes”?

Ariel Lavery: Kind of. Where I grew up, in Boulder, Colorado, there was a bit of a reputation for being home to hippies and stoners, which I was always aware of. And sometimes when I tell people I grew up in Colorado they ask if I smoked a bunch of ganga growing up! But now when I tell people I live in Kentucky, there’s like a whole other set of questions people ask, and way more of them.

Austin Carter: Exactly. Like, do they wear shoes? Do they love horses, bourbon, and the Derby? How do you say Louisville? 

Ariel Lavery: Isn’t it like “Luh-ville?” (Austin laughs) , like “Luo-ville,” or is it “Looi-ville?” My grandparents always said “Looey-ville.”

Austin Carter: They used to have a sign that had all the different pronunciations up, in Louisville.

Ariel Lavery: You know, I actually grew up in Louisville, Colorado.

Austin Carter: How is that one spelled?

Ariel Lavery:  It’s spelled the same but you say it “Lewis-ville.” That’s how Coloradans speak, anyway.

Austin Carter: As we heard from my friend, Angie Hatton, in the opening clip, sometimes people also have a few jokes at the expense of Kentuckians. Have you ever googled “Kentucky Jokes”?

Ariel Lavery: Well, I just did in preparation for this episode and I saw that some of them are pretty crude.

Austin Carter: Yeah. Some of them are kind of awful. And honestly as a Kentuckian they kind of bother me because there is a lot more that is truly funny and much more accurate as it relates to real Kentuckians, than jokes about hillbillies and incest. 

Adario Mercadante: (standup routine) If you've never grown up gay in the south, it's like looking for a “secret gay-gent” while you don't know who the “secret gaygents” are. You know you're on like a park bench like, “Is that you Agent Kyle?” (laughter) “Yes, Agent Dmitri, good to meet you in person! Oh yes!” (laughter)

Ariel Lavery: Now that is actually funny! Who was that?

(theme music starts)

Austin Carter: That’s my friend and fellow Kentuckian, Adario Mercadante doing standup comedy on Zoom. And though he now lives in Los Angeles, pursuing his dreams of entertaining, his story mirrors that of many people, who grew up in rural America, but choose to leave to pursue other opportunities and experiences.

Ariel Lavery: I know it can be really hard for LGBTQ youth in rural places like Kentucky.

Austin Carter: Very much so. But now Adario turns that experience into comedy. And defies expectations of who Kentuckians are, while also making light of the stereotypes we transfer onto others. 

Adario Mercadante: It's tough to not be a stereotype at the same time.

Ariel Lavery: This is Middle of Everywhere, telling big stories from the small places we call home. I’m Ariel Lavery.

Austin Carter: And I’m Austin Carter. Today, “My Old Kentucky Stereotype.”

(theme music ends)

Scene 1 - Secret Gay-gent

Adario Mercadante: How do you say his name? Is it a “Dario” is “Dahrio” like, honestly, people in Kentucky mess my name up more than anywhere, but anybody from anywhere can mess up my name.

Austin Carter: So Adario and I both grew up here in Murray, Kentucky. And we knew each other from high school.

Austin Carter: Hey Adario! How are you, buddy?

Adario Mercadante: Oh, actually today I slept really bad I woke up at like five something it was cold and our stomach hurt. We had extra cheese pepperoni, Papa John's last night... I think that was a big mistake. 

Austin Carter:  And though he’s in LA now, there are things he looks at fondly about Kentucky.

Adario Mercadante: No matter how much bad stuff you want to bring up about Kentucky, because we all have our gripes about home, I would always say, but it's beautiful. It's peaceful. You can get a much better sleep in the south. And it's cheaper. I said, it's a great place to raise a family.  It's a great place if you want to own, like, pets and some land. Here that would cost you so.. much... money! And you might not be happy. So I think that's one thing you got to give back to to the Bluegrass State is that it is beautiful and connects you more with nature and, and, the chance to have, like, a family life.

Ariel Lavery: Yeah, those are things that I totally appreciate as a Kentucky resident now. But I can also see where those things might not be so appealing to a young person.

Austin Carter: Yeah, for sure. And I think there are points where every young person who grows up in a small town wants to get away. And if you’re gay, there are a whole other set of challenges that you face growing up in the rural south. Like Adario’s joke about the “secret gay-gent.” But that humor is bred from suffering.

Adario Mercadante:  I don't know a single other gay man, from my time in high school that doesn't have a mental illness now, and we might still be successful, but we really suffered in a lot of ways mentally, trying to find our identity, and we still do to this day we suffer those consequences of people's ignorance. 

Austin Carter: After high school, Adario started to struggle with mental illness.

Adario Mercadante: There was a time when I was in the psych ward in Murray, you know, there was when I was 19, in college. And then there was when I was 21. I had bipolar 1 diagnosed at that time. And it was one of the worst moments in my life, you know, I had to spend a month in rehab because my parents didn't know what was wrong with me, we didn't know I was bipolar, they just thought I was on a bunch of drinking and drugs.

Austin Carter: Even though he wasn’t drinking much at the time, he cut it out entirely. But he was still struggling to be happy.

Adario Mercadante:  I was in a bad place, I was overweight, I was over like 230 pounds. I knew I had all this drive and passion and talent that I knew that I could share with an audience and the world. 

Austin Carter: And his mom, who he calls his biggest fan, also knew that Adario was meant for something different than small town life.

(thoughtful music starts)

Adario Mercadante: My mom would always say to me in the most loving way, “there's nothing for you here.” And she didn't mean that like she didn't have love for me. She meant that as in she knew that what I was meant to do was to entertain the world. Or at least you know, some variation of interacting with people, and emotions. And she would always say, you know, “there's nothing for you here.”

Ariel Lavery: So, did what made Adario decide to uproot his life in Kentucky and move to L.A.?

Austin Carter: That point came at a family birthday dinner for his grandfather.

Adario Mercadante: And we start talking about my improv, Paducah improv that I had been doing. And I'd been doing that for about a year and I would have to drive from Murray to Paducah, which is about an hour drive, you know, twice a week for rehearsal, and then one show a month, and my parents didn't like how much gas money it was costing. You know, I had been working at Cheri movie theaters for 10 years as an usher. And then I started working at a factory, at Briggs and Stratton.  You know, it wasn't fun working in a factory in the first place. But the improv was giving me life and the shows, people were loving. We were doing great things. They wanted me to quit. They were all coming at me saying you know, I need to give up on this improv at least, and, it really hurt me. And I told them “I should just move” and they were like, “well then just go.” And not in a mean way. It was one of those surreal, like, “Well, then that's what you should do.” And in that moment, I was like, “Well, that's what I'm going to do.” 

Scene 2 - Rebirth

Adario Mercadante: (standup routine) But it's hard to be cute and a gay man. Because a lot of times people just think you're cute because you're gay. “Oh my god. They're holding hands. That's so cute. (laughter) They're sharing a burrito together. They’re so cute! (laughter)They’re arguing about laundry. It’s precious!”  Like, if they looked closer, they'd see we're not just sunshine and rainbows because we're homosexuals on a scroll of puppies through their Twitter feed. No, we're real people! Okay, they should be honest and say things like, “Oh, look, you guys, they’re struggling to pool resources to afford housing. (laughter) Oh that one’s having a panic attack because they grew up gay in the bible belt!” (laughter) 

Austin Carter: Adario moved to LA, leaving his family and boyfriend behind to do a long distance relationship while he tried to get things started. And he hit the ground running.

Adario Mercadante: The second day I got here. I hit the stage at iO West to do improv jams, which, an improv jam is people you've never met before. And you're all just assuming you're all good at improv, and playing together and usually have, like, a really good team that, like, guides   you guys through it and comes and plays with you. I had a great improv set with some very funny people who I went on to be friends with for a long time. And a guy came up to me afterwards and he was like, “Man, you remind me of so many greats: Belushi, Farley...” all these names, and he gave me his card and stuff. And we talked for a little bit... It was just kind of surreal to have that experience from the get-go.

Austin Carter: And L.A. also proved to be a whole new world for Adario as a gay man who had grown up in the south.

Adario Mercadante: I wanted to go clubbing like I've always had the energy to go dance in Kentucky, you don't really have a lot of options. Well, here, they have a ton of them. And they have a place called West Hollywood. Which is, like, I would say one of the gayest places on earth like it's kind of like the gay Mecca…. But I was there and like, I saw all these men holding hands. It was free as a bird, like, everyone was just being themselves being gay. And there's gay music. I mean, I guess there's no gay music, but you know what I'm saying, and the lights and rainbows. And I was like, in shell shock, Austin, like, I got there. And I like, I felt so... not uncomfortable. But it was uncomfortable, because I just had not had that level of freedom.

Ariel Lavery: I’m sure that was an incredibly eye-opening and freeing experience for him.

Austin Carter: Oh, it was. And his comedy was reflecting both his time in Kentucky and the new experiences he was having in L.A.

(electronic music starts)

Adario Mercadante: In my standup, when I first moved here, I definitely was talking a lot about the transition of like, moving from Kentucky to L.A.. I used to tell a joke in the beginning, how someone outside of my window in Crenshaw, I would just hear people's insanity, whether they were homeless, or just normal people getting crazy. One time I heard these people yelling, and they go, “You want to start a war?” And then he laughed. He goes, “Ah, ha, ha.” So I don't know if they were friends or not. But I just, I was enthralled by everything that was L.A., it was like a rebirth, honestly.

Austin Carter: When he first started doing stand up comedy in Murray, Adario was relying on some of those Kentucky tropes and stereotypes for laughs. Jokes about rednecks or marrying your cousin. But in Los Angeles he was starting to evolve.

Adario Mercadante: I think as you progress as a comedian from anywhere, you're doing material based off where you're from at first. And then you start to get deeper into the writing. And you realize there's that's low hanging fruit. And it's also been done before, like, everyone knows that joke. So you're, you, need to find a unique spin on it or, like, a point of view, or there's no reason for you to do that.

Ariel Lavery: Yeah, I feel like when people move away they gain perspective about themselves, and they learn about themselves outside of their home community.

Austin Carter: Yeah I think this was what Adario was experiencing, too. And he was also beginning to see some encouraging signs for his career.

Adario Mercadante: I made some friends and one of them helped me get an audition in front of like agents.  And I got an agent, I got signed within seven months of being here, which is like crazy, because you know, some people have been here forever, they never get signed. Well, over the course of that year, I was with that agency, they helped me a lot to get a lot of things started. But one of the things they told me was that, you know, they wanted me to be kind of their Chris Farley type.

Ariel Lavery: Hey, that’s a big step. And it’s interesting how this need for someone to fit a type in the entertainment world is so pervasive. It’s like we need these archetypes to know where someone fits in.

Austin Carter: You’re right. But Adario’s rebirth in L.A. was also translating into a new sense of pride in himself and in his lifestyle choices.

Adario Mercadante: I started exercising a lot, and maybe making some diet changes, not necessarily because, you know, I, I was eating super healthy, but I think there's less Taco John's out here. (laughs) There's so many fried foods when you think back to Murray, or just Kentucky in general. And then I lost, like, over the course of like three years, I lost like 40 plus pounds. 

Ariel Lavery: Oh, so losing weight was just another part of this whole new Adario.

Austin Carter: For sure. But those changes made his agency view him differently.

Adario Mercadante: I started losing weight. And eventually they had to tell me like, “We just, we don't know how to describe you anymore. Because you're going through this transformation.” And eventually, you know, when they had to drop me. They said that, you know, we just don't think we would be good for your career. Now maybe that's something they say to everybody. But there is a part of me that believes them because I feel much happier in this, like, skinnier body proud gay man from the south.

Scene 3 - My Old Kentucky Stereotype

Adario Mercadante: (standup routine) It's tough to not be a stereotype at the same time. For example. yes, I was a Zumba instructor. (laughter) But I was a terrible Zumba instructor. Okay, I had one friend from high school. I had one of my mother's friends and my broken dreams. That's it. That's all I had! I was 40 lbs heavier at the time, so I was having to take breaks all the time. And you know, I'd be in there, just, like “(out of breath) How’d you girls like that song?” You know, there’s Tammy over there. Just like “Look, Adario, I came here to lose 20 pounds, you’ve taken three breaks in 15 minutes. So I'm just going to lead the class from here. Let's go everybody! 1, 2, 3 and feel it, feel it. That's it, beat, and move, and...” And I guess the student’s become the master! (laughter) 

Ariel Lavery: So Adario was at a really tough point in his life before he left Kentucky. And moving to L.A. was this huge turning point for him. And a liberating experience as a gay man from the small town south. But he still faced these expectations of who he was or could be, or what a person from Kentucky was even like.

Austin Carter: Exactly. But he started to realize that those expectations could be the avenue for presenting his own point of view.

Adario Mercadante: What they will tell you when you ask for agents, managers, producers to tell you like “What can I do to get going?” They'll say, well, you need to treat yourself as the business, you are a product, you need to sell your product, you need to market your product, you need to label your product, it needs to be clearly defined in a sentence. Things like that hurt your pride as an artist. But then you realize, like, oh, this is so that I can form these avenues to get where I want to go. And then it's up to me to present the gravitas of the material. It's up to me to provide the point of view. 

Austin Carter: Sometimes that means labeling his product in a certain way.

Adario Mercadante: So you might say, “Well, I'm from Kentucky, and I'm gay.” That's definitely something I can roll with every comedy set if I want. Or I can say, “Well, I used to be a Zumba instructor. I used to be a boxer, I used to be a furry.” “Used to be,” asterisk. But do I want to talk about all that? Is that something that's defining me? Well, maybe it's more, I'm defining the comic who is a storyteller. That's a little more broad, you know, like, you can be like, Oh, well, I have all these stories from Kentucky. And then they can talk about maybe you're the southern storyteller. Maybe you're the, you know, gay energy guy. Well, all those things are things you have to kind of test out out loud. You have to say them, you have to try them. You have to see how they stick and fit. And then what makes you feel good, because if you hate it, well, you might not work as hard on it. 

Austin Carter: And it all pays off when he gets the laughs.

Adario Mercadante: And then I think once you hear those laughs, then you can kind of decide, I do want to be the Zumba, Kentucky, gay, comic, boxer guy, or I do want to be the fish -out-of-water guy. And from there, that's when you can start getting work, which is the whole point. Like, we can't survive in L.A.( without a survival job, they call it, usually.

Austin Carter: At the same time, he upends expectations of who a guy named Adario Mercadante should be.

(jazzy, slow country music starts)

Adario Mercadante: When people hear “Adario Mercadante” they already make assumptions that maybe I like, I don't speak Spanish, Austin, you know, my, my dad was Puerto Rican, Italian. I'm from Murray, Kentucky…. So it’s kind of fun to be like...and I'm also kind of masculine. I'm not necessarily a super fem gay guy. I just am myself. But it's kind of fun to subvert these expectations.

Conclusion

Adario Mercadante: (standup routine) Sirloin Stockade!  Now my boys in Kentucky know what that’s about, that’s some good meat right there. 

Adario Mercadante: You can just do a couple Southern lines of dialogue people here will laugh. I'm not saying that's going to carry you for five minutes. But it's not too hard to get a little laugh out of that. ‘Cause it's honest. And it's unexpected.

Austin Carter: Through this whole journey from western Kentucky to the West Coast, Adario has continued to be himself and explore who he is as a comedian and entertainer. 

(theme music starts)

Ariel Lavery: It seems like it’s taken a long time to grapple with who “himself” is. From struggling with stereotypes to getting laughs from them, that road has taught Adario to accept the positives and negatives of who he is and where he comes from.

Adario Mercadante: I'm only here because of my support group. I'm only here because my family. I'm here because of my, my boyfriend. I'm here because of friends. I'm here because of every single person who's told me that they believe in me.

Austin Carter: That’s awesome, man. I’m so proud for you.

Adario Mercadante: Thank you, Austin.

Credits

Visit us at middleofeverywherepod.org. While you’re there sign up for our newsletter so you’ll always be the first to know about exciting updates and new episodes.

This episode of Middle of Everywhere was produced by me, Austin Carter, with editorial help from my cohost, Ariel Lavery. Our editor is Naomi Starobin.  Our theme music was composed and recorded by Time on the String sound studio in Paducah, Kentucky.  Other scoring was from APM music. Marketing and sponsorship support comes from Dixie Lynn. Thank you to our intern, Serenity Rogers. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at middleofeverywherepod. Middle of Everywhere is a production of WKMS and PRX. This program is made possible, in part, by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private organization funded by the American people.